# Discover Gilded Age Treasures in the Richard Hunt Collection

Author Sam Watters offers an introduction of the Hunt Collection at the Library of Congress, assembled by Richard Morris Hunt (1827-1895), renowned American architect of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and Vanderbilt family mansions, and his wife, shipping heiress Catharine Howland Hunt (1841-1909). See some of the 15,000 rare books, drawings, photos, sketchbooks and large-scale scrapbooks the couple collected and created over 50 years, inspired by Richard’s vision for an architectural museum and library that would educate and “civilize” industrial America after the Civil War. Sam Watters is the author of both the illustrated cultural biography, “The Gilded Life of Richard Morris Hunt” (2024) and of “Richard Morris Hunt: The Collector” (2025), the illustrated tale of Richard and Catharine’s adventurous art collecting. His award-winning illustrated book “Gardens for a Beautiful America” (2013) recounts the story of the pioneering photographer Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864-1952) and the more than 1,000 colored garden lantern slides she donated to the Library of Congress.

- Kind: Talk
- Year: 2025
- Runtime: 5 min
- By: Watters, Sam
- Archive: [Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/item/video-10706/)
- Licence or status: Rights statement at the Library of Congress (as the archive states it)
- Credit: Library of Congress
- Who can watch: Teens profiles and older (the archive gives no rating; placed by Invisible Network from its collection and subjects)

[Watch now](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/watch/archive/loc/video-10706?play=1)